51+ Dashiell Hammett Quotes On Death, Freedom And Freedom Of Speech

Dashiell Hammett was an American author and screenwriter who is best known for his hard-boiled detective fiction. He wrote popular stories such as The Maltese Falcon and The Thin Man, which have been adapted into films. He is considered to be one of the most influential authors in the genre of detective fiction. Following is our collection on famous quotes by Dashiell Hammett on death, love, freedom.

Top 10 Dashiell Hammett Quotes

1. I don t mind a reasonable amount of trouble.
2. I've been as bad an influence on American literature as anyone I can think of.
3. Joel Cairo: You always have a very smooth explanation ready. Sam Spade: What do you want me to do, learn to stutter?
4. The problem with putting two and two together is that sometimes you get four, and sometimes you get twenty-two.
5. Listen, darling, tomorrow I'll buy you a whole lot of detective stories, but don't worry your pretty little head over mysteries tonight.
6. Feed the lettuce to the bunny and eat the bunny.
7. My way of learning is to heave a wild and unpredictable monkey-wrench into the machinery.
8. I couldn't be fonder of you if you were my own son. But, well, if you lose a son, its possible to get another. There's only one Maltese Falcon.
9. I once knew a man who stole a Ferris Wheel.
10. The cheaper the crook, the gaudier the patter.

Dashiell Hammett Short Quotes

• You got to look on the bright side, even if there ain't one.
• She grinned at me. 'You got types?' 'Only you darling - lanky brunettes with wicked jaws.
• With what dope I got I think it fills me in pretty well.
• The outcome of successful planning always looks like luck to saps.
• Strictly speaking, there are no real substitutes for sexual satisfaction
• I haven't any sort of plans for the future but I reckon things will work out in some manner.
• Most things in San Francisco can be bought or taken.
• He felt like somebody had taken the lid off life and let him see the works.
• It's awfully easy to be in love in jail
• The roof might fall in; anything could happen.

Dashiell Hammett Famous Quotes And Sayings

What I try to do is write a story about a detective rather than a detective story. Keeping the reader fooled until the last, possible moment is a good trick and I usually try to play it, but I can't attach more than secondary importance to it. The puzzle isn't so interesting to me as the behavior of the detective attacking it. — Dashiell Hammett

The people who lie the most are nearly always the clumsiest at it, and they're easier to fool with lies than most people, too. You'd think they'd be on the look-out for lies, but they seem to be the very ones that will believe almost anything at all. — Dashiell Hammett

Brigid: I haven't lived a good life - I've been bad, worse than you could know. Spade: That's good, because if you actually were as innocent as you pretend to be, we'd never get anywhere. — Dashiell Hammett

You're drunk, and I'm drunk, and I'm just exactly drunk enough to tell you anything you want to know. That's the kind of girl I am. If I like a person, I'll tell them anything they want to know. Just ask me. Go ahead, ask me. — Dashiell Hammett

A lot of fancier yarns come from people trying to tell the truth. It’s not easy once you’re out of the habit. — Dashiell Hammett

I distrust a man that says when. If he's got to be careful not to drink to much it's because he's not to be trusted when he does. — Dashiell Hammett

Our lawyers had their chat with the Supreme Court Justice, and promised to repast the chat to other members of the Supreme Court to find out whether they wanted to hear us out. — Dashiell Hammett

Talking is something you can't do judiciously unless you keep in practice. — Dashiell Hammett

I haven't laughed so much over anything since the hogs ate my kid brother. — Dashiell Hammett

The boy spoke two words, the first a short guttural verb, the second “you. — Dashiell Hammett

We didn't exactly believe your story.' Then --?' 'We believed your two hundred dollars.' 'You mean --' She seemed not to know what he meant. 'I mean that you paid us more than if you'd been telling the truth,' he explained blandly, 'and enough more to make it all right. — Dashiell Hammett

Three times I have been mistaken for a prohibition agent, but never had any trouble clearing myself. — Dashiell Hammett

Nora: "How do you feel?" Nick: "Terrible. I must've gone to bed sober. — Dashiell Hammett

You don't pay a prostitute for sex, you pay her to leave afterwards. — Dashiell Hammett

Nick: "Don't you think maybe a drink would help you to sleep?" Nora: "No, thanks." Nick: "Maybe it would if I took one. — Dashiell Hammett

When you write, you want fame, fortune and personal satisfaction. You want to write what you want to write and feel it's good, and you want this to go on for hundreds of years. You're not likely ever to get all these things, and you're not likely to give up writing and commit suicide if you don't, but that is -- and should be -- your goal. Anything else is kind of piddling. — Dashiell Hammett

If you have a story that seems worth telling, and you think you can tell it worthily, then the thing for you to do is to tell it, regardless of whether it has to do with sex, sailors or mounted policemen. — Dashiell Hammett

The truth is you don't like the theater except the times when you're in a room by yourself putting the play on paper. — Dashiell Hammett

Listen, Dundy, it's been a long time since I burst into tears because a policeman didn't like me. — Dashiell Hammett

I found I was repeating myself. It is the beginning of the end when you discover you have style. — Dashiell Hammett

Nora said: 'I love you, Nicky, because you smell nice and know such fascinating people. — Dashiell Hammett

...What disturbed him was the discovery that in sensibly ordering his affairs he had got out of step, and not into step, with Life. — Dashiell Hammett

When a man's partner is killed he's supposed to do something about it. It doesn't make any difference what you thought of him. He was your partner and you're supposed to do something about it. Then it happens we were in the detective business. Well, when one of your organization gets killed it's bad business to let the killer get away with it. It's bad all around-bad for that one organization, bad for every detective everywhere. Sam Spade — Dashiell Hammett

I like women. I really like women. — Dashiell Hammett

Yes,' Spade growled. 'And when you're slapped you'll take it and like it.' He released Cairo's wrist and with a thick open hand struck the side of his face three times savagely. — Dashiell Hammett

To get what he wanted, a man had to give other people what they wanted. — Dashiell Hammett

The face she made at me was probably meant for a smile. Whatever it was, it beat me. I was afraid she'd do it again, so I surrendered — Dashiell Hammett

Who shot him? I asked. The grey man scratched the back of his neck and said: Somebody with a gun. — Dashiell Hammett

I first heard Personville called Poisonville by a red-haired mucker named Hickey Dewey in the Big Ship in Butte. He also called his shirt a shoit. — Dashiell Hammett

Samuel Spade's jaw was long and bony, his chin a jutting v under the more flexible v of his mouth. His nostrils curved back to make another, smaller, v. His yellow-grey eyes were horizontal. The V motif was picked up again by thickish brows rising outward from twin creases above a hooked nose, and his pale brown hair grew down--from high flat temples--in a point on his forehead. He looked rather pleasantly like a blond Satan. — Dashiell Hammett

He looked rather pleasantly, like a blonde satan. — Dashiell Hammett

Life Lessons by Dashiell Hammett

1. Dashiell Hammett's work emphasizes the importance of moral ambiguity and the idea that justice is not always served in a black and white fashion.
2. His stories often involve characters who make difficult decisions in order to protect themselves or those they care about.
3. He also emphasizes the importance of understanding the motivations of all characters, regardless of whether they are good or bad.